JP2918036B2 - Portable storage devices - Google Patents

Description

DETAILED DESCRIPTION OF THE INVENTION

[0001]

[0001] 1. Field of the Invention [0002] The present invention relates to a portable storage device, and more particularly, to a portable storage device that can be used as a media viewer by connecting a portable storage device used for a portable information processing device to a display.

[0002]

2. Description of the Related Art A small and thin hard disk device mounted on a portable information processing device such as a notebook computer or a mobile device is generally provided with a PCMCIA (Personal Computer) for the information processing device.
Memory Card International Association).

When the hard disk device is also used as a recording device for various information processing devices, an OS (Operating System) is installed in a hard disk device and registered as a boot disk or a floppy disk in each device. It is necessary to determine a recording format in advance, such as an exchangeable (exchangeable) medium such as an optical disk or an optical disk.

[0004]

As described above, the hard disk drive is not used as a replaceable (replaceable) data medium, and therefore, the hard disk drive can be used together with various devices and can be replaced ( It is required to be usable as an exchangeable data medium.

Accordingly, the present invention has been made in view of such a demand, and an object thereof is to connect a portable information processing device such as a notebook computer or a mobile device as a data medium, and An object of the present invention is to provide a portable storage device that can be used as a media viewer by being connected to another display device and is exchangeable.

[0006]

According to the present invention, there is provided a portable storage device on which a recording medium is mounted and a display device is freely connectable to a main body. And control means for controlling display of the recording information of the recording medium on the display device in accordance with the resolution information transmitted in response to the request. Can be

The information processing apparatus is configured to be freely connectable to an information processing apparatus other than the display apparatus. When the type of the apparatus connected to the main body is determined to determine that the display apparatus is mounted, Is characterized by further comprising a determination means for activating the control means.

The control means controls the display on the display device while reading out the recording information of the recording medium in the order of the physical address, and the control means further comprises a file name of the recording information of the recording medium. The file name is controlled to be displayed on the display device.

Further, when the device connected to the main body is the information processing device, the determining means deactivates the control means, and the determining means is connected to the main body. When the device is the information processing device,
A control unit for controlling the recording medium to operate as a recording medium of the information processing apparatus is activated.

The operation of the present invention will be described. The portable storage device is configured to be freely connectable to an information processing device such as a portable display device or a mobile computer. When it is determined that the portable display device is connected, the portable storage device requests resolution information from the display device. Then, display control of the recording information of the recording medium is performed in accordance with the resolution information, and when it is determined that an information processing device other than the display device is connected, the device can be used as a normal disk device. .

[0011]

Embodiments of the present invention will be described below with reference to the drawings.

FIG. 1 is a system block diagram of an embodiment of the present invention. Referring to FIG. 1, a disk device 1 as a portable storage device is a detachable interface, for example, TYPE II or TYPE I of PCMCIA.
It is compatible with II and other devices and is a small and thin device.
The display device 2 and the mobile computer 3 can be freely connected to the main body of the disk device 1,
It is electrically coupled to the disk device 1 via an interface corresponding to CIA TYPE II, TYPE III, or the like.

The disk device 1 uses, for example, a hard disk as a recording medium 12, and has a first disk controller 13 for managing disk information, a disk format and logical / physical address conversion, and a normal disk access protocol (for example, SCSI (Small Computer S
a second disk controller 14 that processes a protocol such as a system interface), a disk controller switching unit 11 that switches between these two disk controllers, and a display controller 15 that performs data display control according to the resolution of the display device 2. Have.

Although not particularly shown, the disk drive 1
Has a power source such as a battery. The display device 2 includes, for example, a liquid crystal display 21, a ROM (read only memory) 23 storing resolution information of the liquid crystal display 21 in advance, and a TYPE I of PCMCIA.
It has an interface 22 corresponding to I and TYPE III.

The mobile computer 3 has an OS (Operating System) 31 and a device driver 32 for controlling the drive of the disk drive 1.

The operation of the embodiment of FIG. 1 will be described with reference to the flowcharts of FIGS. FIG. 2 is a flowchart showing the processing operation of the disk controller switching unit 11, and FIG. 3 is a flowchart showing the processing operation of the first disk controller 13.

First, referring to FIG. 2, the disk controller switching unit 11 performs an operation of confirming a connection partner of a device connected to the main body of the disk device 1 (step S1). This connection partner can be confirmed by a well-known shake hand method. For example, a method using signals such as Correct-Device is used.

Now, assuming that the display device 2 is connected, a logic circuit driven by a battery power supply is provided on the display device 2 side, and
It can be realized by the shake hand method using signals such as the Correct-Device. When it is determined that the display device 2 is connected by the shake hand method (step S2), the disk controller switching unit 11 passes control to the first disk controller 13 (step S3).

The first disk controller 13 that has received the notification from the disk controller switching unit 11 to transfer the control (step S11) turns on the power supply line to the display device 2 (step S1).
2) Activate the display device 2. Then, the first disk controller 13 operates the RO of the display device 2.
The resolution information of the display 21 is read from M23 (step S13), and the resolution of the display device 2 is obtained. The obtained resolution information is set in the display controller 15 (step S14).

Thereafter, the first disk controller 13
Reads the initial data from the disk 12 (step S1).
5), it is supplied to the display device 2 via the display controller 15 and is displayed on the display 21 (step S16).

For example, when the disk device 1 is used as a video playback viewer, the display controller 15 has a management table for managing the head physical address of video data and the like, and executes a sequential read. To control. At the same time, the display controller 15 has an address in which the video menu is stored. The video menu can be read from the disk 12 by using this address, and can be displayed on the display 21.

When the disk device 1 is used for other than a video reproduction viewer, a disk controller 13 as shown in FIG. 4 is used. FIG. 4 is a diagram showing a configuration example of the first disk controller 13 in this case and peripheral blocks related thereto, and the same parts as those in FIG. 1 are denoted by the same reference numerals.

Referring to FIG. 4, the first disk controller 13 includes a protocol control unit 131 for requesting read / write to the disk 12 and a table unit 132 for managing disk information. Protocol control unit 1
31 makes a data read / write request to the disk 12 according to, for example, the SCSI protocol,
Temporarily store data. The table unit 132 is the disk 1
2, the data management information is read, and the file names of the files stored on the disk 12 are recorded. By using the table unit 132, it is possible to use it as a dictionary or as an electronic book.

Referring again to FIG. 2, when the connection partner device is not the display device 2 but a computer device (in this example, the mobile computer 3) and is connected as a peripheral device of the mobile computer 3, The disk controller switching unit 11 determines "N" in step S2.
O ”. In this case, the above-described Correct-Device
Since no response signal is returned in the confirmation step S1 in the shake hand system using signals such as the above, it is recognized that the computer 3 is connected instead of the display device 2 being connected.

Then, the power of the disk device 1 is turned off (step S4), and the power supply is switched from the connected mobile computer 3 (step S5). At the same time, it switches to the second disk controller 14 as a disk controller (step S6). Thereafter, the mobile computer 3 waits for power-on (step S
7), the device check and the like activated upon power-on are handled through the second disk controller 14.

In the above embodiment, a hard disk is used as an example of a storage medium. However, the present invention is not limited to this, and any storage medium and storage device having a portable structure may be used. , A mobile computer is used as an example of an information processing device.
The present invention is also applicable to general information processing apparatuses of a desktop type and a laptop type.

[0027]

As described above, according to the present invention, the portable display device storing information such as the resolution of the display and the disk device can be connected by an interface, and both are detachable. As a result, the disk device can be combined with various display devices, so that the disk device can be widely used as a replaceable data medium.

[Brief description of the drawings]

FIG. 1 is a block diagram of an embodiment of the present invention.

FIG. 2 is a flowchart showing a processing operation of a disk controller switching unit 11 of FIG.

FIG. 3 is a flowchart showing a processing operation of a first disk controller 13 of FIG. 1;

FIG. 4 is a block diagram showing a partial configuration of another embodiment of the present invention.

[Explanation of symbols]

 DESCRIPTION OF SYMBOLS 1 Disk device 2 Display device 3 Mobile computer 11 Disk controller switching unit 12 Disk 13 First disk controller 14 Second disk controller 15 Display controller 21 Display 23 ROM 31 OS 32 Device driver 131 Protocol control unit 132 Table unit

Claims (8)

(57) [Claims] 1. A portable storage device in which a recording medium is mounted and a display device is freely connectable to a main body. The portable storage device requests the display device to transmit resolution information of the display device, and responds to the request. Control means for controlling display of the recording information of the recording medium on the display device according to the resolution information transmitted as
A portable storage device comprising: 2. The portable storage device according to claim 1, wherein the portable storage device is configured to be freely connectable to an information processing device other than the display device. 3. The apparatus according to claim 2, further comprising: a determination unit that starts the control unit when the type of the device connected to the main body is determined and the display device is determined to be mounted. 3. The portable storage device according to 2. 4. The portable storage device according to claim 3, wherein said control means controls the display on said display device while reading out the recording information of said recording medium in the order of its physical address. 5. The apparatus according to claim 3, wherein said control means has means for managing a file name of recording information of said recording medium, and controls display of said file name on said display device. Portable storage device. 6. The portable storage device according to claim 3, wherein the determination unit sets the control unit to a non-activated state when the device connected to the main body is the information processing device. 7. When the device connected to the main body is the information processing device, the determination unit activates a control unit that controls the recording medium to operate as a recording medium of the information processing device. 7. The portable storage device according to claim 6, wherein: 8. The portable storage device according to claim 1, wherein said recording medium is a hard disk medium.